ICLEI South Asia participated in the “5th International Forum on Low Carbon Cities & 2025 Regional Partners Forum on Sustainable Urban Development” held from 25-27 August 2025 in Bangkok, Thailand. The event was organised by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP), the secretariat of the North-East Asian Subregional Programme for Environmental Cooperation (NEASPEC), Incheon Metropolitan City, and in collaboration with the Asia-Pacific Localisation Partnership for Sustainable Cities (APLP-CITIES) and UN-Habitat. The Forum gathered representatives from national and local governments, international organisations, academia, and civil society to deliberate on the theme “Low-Carbon Cities and Demographic Change”.

Speaking at the session on “Partnerships & Implementation – Collaborative Approaches to Enabling Inclusive & Climate Resilient City Development,” Divya Prakash Vyas, Associate Director, Head, Urban Practice at ICLEI South Asia, stressed that inclusivity and equity must be at the core of urban climate strategies. Reflecting on ICLEI’s ‘Equitable Urban Development’ pathway — through which it supports local and regional governments in advancing inclusive, just, and people-centred development — from the lens of addressing inclusivity, he emphasised that the needs of the poorest and the most vulnerable sections of society must be kept ahead of others. He emphasised that ensuring equitable access to healthcare, food, and basic survival needs first requires addressing the impacts of climatic extremes such as heat, drought, and flooding. Investments in public transport infrastructure should both guarantee access to essential services during extreme climate events and be resilient to future climate hazards.

However, in cities today, rising land values are pushing vulnerable populations to the fringes. Municipal boundaries are becoming barriers, resulting in the agglomeration of populations in peri-urban areas. 

Extreme heat and flooding severely affect vulnerable livelihoods, health, and well-being, with impacts worsening in socially stratified communities.

ICLEI South Asia’s ‘Loss and Damage assessment’ for children in Udaipur revealed that women from low-income and socially unprivileged communities often missed out on prenatal care due to social barriers. Similarly, in Ahmedabad, tribal migrants involved in small trades such as rope have to navigate frequently disrupted supply chain due to floods and reduced productivity in workspaces exposed to extreme heat. 

Migrant settlers often move cities in search of better-paying jobs, resulting in them staying in squatter settlements in derelict areas while providing essential services to homes, industries, and commercial establishments — a classic example of poor subsidising the rich. With an estimated 60% of jobs in Global South cities being informal in nature, this raises a critical question: can our engines of economic growth survive in the absence of this critical workforce? 

Mr Divya Prakash highlighted that policies and frameworks need to be contextualised to local realities of the Global South. While policy makers should embrace technology-based solutions, but at the same time, they must ensure inclusivity and prioritise that ‘no one is actually left behind’. Whether these are innovative land mechanisms or technology-based interventions, ex-post realities need to inform ex-ante scenarios.

There is no bigger success than multi-lateral investments and international local collaborations resulting in community ownership of solutions. The need of the hour is to move from apathy to care and concern, leading to more unified communities and inclusive and resilient cities. ICLEI South Asia remains firmly committed to advancing equitable, just, and people-centred urban development across the region.